An Overflowing Inbox Is Not A Kanban System

From David Allen (no link available):

It is a residue from the industrial and agricultural world, I think, when the things to be done were much more physically self-evident. The "piles" in most offices nowadays seem just meager attempts to reproduce the self-evidence of the crops, the machinery, the things to be made and moved of bygone times. But self-evidence is not forthcoming without more discrete focus and more self-directed thinking.

From a lean perspective, I think what people are looking for is a kanban system and visual controls to manage their work in the office. When the inbox starts to overflow, time to sort through it. When the mailbox gets overloaded with email, and the anxiety level gets high enough, time to scan the messages.

But these are emotional rather than rational cues.

Better to have cues built on an optimal worklow.  This means emptying all the buckets on a daily basis, and using your organizational system to cue when to take action on items. Get the mailbox down to zero three times daily, even if this means putting some of those emails in an @Action folder, until you have time to fully process them. Then cue up the work based on deadlines (i.e. customer demand) and maintaining continuous flow.

Overflowing buckets also indicate excessive inventory and poor processes. Time to rework your system.

And your inbox usually operates as a push system, rather than a pull system.

The point here is to use real cues instead of the artifical and misleading physical cues that emerge in an office environment.  The height of paper stacked on your credenza doesn't (or shouldn't) tell you what to do and when to do it.

Capture Clearinghouse

With the explosion of iPhone apps, note taking applications, and digital dictation software, there is (maybe literally) a million ways to capture ideas. Too many. A fundamental principle of GTD is to have a good system for capturing ideas whenever and wherever they occur. You don't have to capture much -- just enough to recall the idea later for full processing.

The problem with having so many capturing tools available is that they scatter your information, when the whole point is to ensure your ideas get timely developed and not lost in the wave of oncoming information.

How do you corral your information if it's spread across separate applications for entering time, recording expenses, managing tasks, and capturing everyday notes?

My solution is to make my Microsoft Outlook inbox the clearinghouse for almost every input. During my daily mailbox reviews, I translate these captured thoughts into projects, transfer information to lists, add to project support material folders, or otherwise appropriately process it.

I recommend making every one of your capturing devices point back to your email inbox. For example:

• Blind copy yourself on emails so you can follow up on assignments (Waiting Fors)

• Email yourself text notes from your handheld

• Use ReQall or Jott to email yourself audio notes

• Use Google Voice to transcribe voicemails and send them to your inbox

• Email yourself URLs from websites for further browsing

• When away from your desk, write a time entry in an email to yourself from your handheld

• Forward emails from other email accounts if they require action

• Email yourself notes from Evernote or other note taking applications, if they require follow up

• Record digital messages and immediately email them to yourself (or use Dragon Dictation to transcribe from your handheld)

Of course, using your Outlook inbox as a clearinghouse makes the most sense if you use Outlook as your list tool. For example, I customize Outlook for managing my projects list, next action lists, and reference lists. If you use some other application to manage your lists, you should make that application your clearinghouse instead.

There's also a few key inputs that don't go directly to my inbox, such as notes on my legal pad. I also collect pieces of paper, such as receipts and business cards, which need follow up. For these items, I make sure to process them during my weekly review.

But for day-to-day capturing, my inbox is it.

D. Mark Jackson